How Do I Heal from Insecure Attachment?
Insecure attachment can show up as anxiety, avoidance, or a push-pull dynamic in your relationships. You may find yourself constantly worrying about being abandoned, keeping people at arm’s length, or swinging between craving closeness and fearing it. If this sounds familiar, you’re not alone. And healing is possible.
This post will walk you through what insecure attachment is, how it develops, and how therapy can support you in moving toward secure, fulfilling relationships.
What Is Insecure Attachment?
Insecure attachment refers to patterns of relating to others that were shaped in early relationships—usually with caregivers—where emotional needs weren’t consistently met. These patterns can linger into adulthood and affect how we trust, connect, and respond to intimacy.
There are three common types:
Anxious attachment: You may fear being rejected or abandoned, crave closeness, and feel a strong need for reassurance.
Avoidant attachment: You may value independence so highly that you struggle with vulnerability or emotional closeness.
Disorganized attachment: You may want closeness but also feel fearful of it, often due to early trauma or chaotic caregiving.
How Insecure Attachment Develops
As children, we rely on caregivers for safety and co-regulation. When those relationships are emotionally inconsistent, neglectful, or overwhelming, we learn strategies to protect ourselves:
Becoming hyper-aware of others’ moods to prevent disconnection (anxious)
Shutting down emotions to feel safe (avoidant)
Freezing or becoming confused about what to expect in relationships (disorganized)
These coping strategies helped you survive back then. But in adulthood, they may limit how deeply you can connect with others or with yourself.
Healing Insecure Attachment Starts with Awareness
The first step in healing is recognizing your patterns with curiosity, not shame.
Ask yourself:
Do I often feel not “enough” or fear being too much?
Do I pull away when things get emotionally close?
Do I overanalyze texts, tone, or facial expressions?
Do I feel safer alone, even if I crave connection?
Becoming aware of these patterns creates space for change.
What Healing Looks Like in Therapy
1. A Secure Relationship with Your Therapist
Healing insecure attachment often begins in the therapy room. Through consistent, attuned interactions with a therapist, you begin to experience a relationship where your emotional needs are noticed and respected—sometimes for the first time.
This is especially important if you grew up being dismissed, criticized, or parentified.
2. Reworking Your Internal Beliefs
You may hold beliefs like:
“I’m too much.”
“I have to earn love.”
“Needing others makes me weak.”
“I need to solve problems on my own.”
Attachment-based therapy helps explore where those beliefs came from and gently shift them. Together, we bring insight to your story and compassion to your protective parts.
3. Bottom-Up & Top-Down Support
Because attachment patterns live in the body as well as the mind, I use a combination of approaches:
Somatic therapy and mindfulness to help you notice and regulate nervous system responses.
Parts work (IFS) to understand internal conflicts.
EMDR to process memories and shift emotional patterns.
Healing insecure attachment isn’t just about understanding the past. It’s about feeling safe enough in the present to show up differently.
How Long Does It Take to Heal?
There’s no one-size-fits-all timeline. But change is possible with time, safety, and support. Healing happens in layers, not overnight. What’s important is not “fixing” yourself—but learning how to feel connected, calm, and true to who you are. Healing is a journey. You will need to “live” in a way that builds security, not checking off the boxes and getting the tasks “done”.
Final Thoughts
If you’ve ever felt like your relationships are harder than they should be, or like you’re always bracing for loss or rejection—you’re not broken. You’re responding in ways that once made sense, even if they no longer serve you.
Healing insecure attachment means slowly rewriting those relational patterns. Therapy offers a space to do that with support, curiosity, and care.
Ready to Begin Healing?
You don’t have to keep repeating the same patterns in relationships — or carry the weight of unmet needs alone. Whether you’re navigating anxious attachment, avoidant tendencies, or the painful mix of both, therapy can help you move toward more secure, connected, and grounded ways of being.
I offer online trauma-informed therapy for adults across Ontario and some other provinces, with a focus on relational trauma, complex trauma, and identity-based stress. We can move at your pace, together.
